The Cunning (18+)

47

"What the fuck are you going to do about it then, Jase?" Ramon asked. Sam and Jase were sitting in Ramon's home office on an expensive leather sofa not made to be comfortable. Across from them, behind the rosewood desk, was Ramon in a tailored grey suit.

"We'll kill him. I'm bored with it now," Jase sighed.

"And how are you going to do that?" Ramon sat back, intertwining his fingers and resting them on his lower stomach. He wasn't a small man, but he wasn't huge in any sense. The stomach was new, a side effect of getting older and his metabolism slowing down. He was also thinning at the crown.

"The less you know, the better. You've got Filth all over you from the explosion. I'm not disclosing information that would make you a suspect," Jase replied. Ramon looked at each of the men, shaking his head.

"Why didn't you kill him when he said no?" he asked.

"We were in public," Jase replied.

Ramon slapped his hands on the desk then pointed a sausage finger at Jase, "You've made a right cock up of this. Get it fucking sorted, pronto."

Jase refrained from rolling his eyes. "I've never let you down before, have I?" He raised his brows, and Ramon grumbled.

"I want it over by the end of the month, max."

*

"So, what's the plan?" Sam asked, getting into Jase's Mercedes. Jase lit a cigarette, winding the window down but not starting the engine.

"I'll get someone to find out what car Mitch drives, have Kieran hook a little explosive up to his engine. The second the key turns in his ignition, he'll be history, and we'll all be home in time for dinner." But his heart wasn't in it. Since that morning, his mind wouldn't allow space for anything that didn't involve Madison. He couldn't shift the images of her dancing or lying on the bed, fiddling with her underwear. Or the morbidly curious look she gave him when she asked what it was like to kill someone. Jase's body count wasn't exactly small, but no one had the effect Madison had on him. That sickening uncertainty she drew out of him was thrilling, in a backwards 'need-a-therapist' kind of way.

It was human nature to desire the unattainable. Everyone wants to press the big red button, Jase was no exception. She was getting to him, more so than before. He intended to make the rest of her life in the house a living hell but her quick switch stopped him in his tracks. Madison wore personalities like other people wore hats. Every time he thought he'd finished her book, another chapter appeared, luring him in.

They went back to the house. Jase didn't stay long, he had shots to drop and ticks to pick up. Sam went upstairs to Janine's room with a bowl of cornflakes, putting it on her vanity where she was doing her make up.

"If Jase isn't in, am I okay to go sit with Madison?" she asked as Sam lay down on her bed. He looked at her with a sceptical frown. Usually, she'd be all over Sam in his free time, however, like Jase, her head was a swamp of Madison. She needed updates, the suspense was killing her.

"Why?" he asked. Janine shrugged, trying not to rouse too much suspicion.

"It's not often I get to make a friend in this place."

Sam grunted. "You should know better than making friends with the girls here." Janine looked down at her lap. He was talking about Rachel, a girl who lived in the house when Janine first arrived. She was one of the girls Jase shot when drugs went missing. Janine had shared a room with her for a solid month. They'd gotten quite close and then she was... gone. No funeral. No one-minute silence in her memory. Wiped off the face of the Earth as if she was never there.

"Well it would be nice to have someone that isn't Lily to talk to about periods and-" As planned, Sam grimaced, waving his hand.

"Fine, go. Just don't go picking up any of her habits. She's a bad influence." Janine grinned. He had no idea how right he was, but she wasn't about to take a page out of Madison's book. Janine was relatively comfortable with her life, there was nothing for her out in the real world. Her world was Sam. However, there was a growing part of her that wanted Madison to keep pushing, to do what no girl had done before. Picking her bowl up, she went and knocked on Jase's bedroom door.

"Come in," Madison called. She was surprised when Janine walked in, closing the door behind her. Not that anyone else would have knocked.

"How are we doing?" Janine asked, sitting cross-legged on the drawers. Madison wasn't sure how much she wanted to disclose. She was conflicted about how she felt because she didn't understand it. Flirting and seduction were unchartered territories for her and she hadn't quite processed all the new feelings that accompanied them.

"In what sense?"

"With Jase. He was watching you dance last night, and I mean watching," Janine said, wriggling her toes in excitement.

Madison sucked her lip in, hiding the involuntary smile. "You were right," she said. There was an odd shadow of shame that she couldn't quite get over though.

"Men are so predictable," Janine said matter-of-factly. "Has he said anything?"

"Nothing substantial." Madison thought back to the morning. He'd definitely been suspicious but that hadn't stopped him or her. "It's like he knows. I don't know how to explain it." Janine was spooning heaps of cornflakes into her mouth, listening intently. "It kind of makes me feel gross, this whole thing, but," she shook her head, "I don't know how to feel. It's like that feeling in your stomach when you go over a hill in a car."

"You should feel powerful," Janine offered, slurping milk off her spoon. "I know it's a bit warped, coming from me, but getting the undivided attention from a guy like Jase is a boss move. I didn't even know he had a type, but apparently, he does, and it's you."

Madison picked up the cigarettes Jase had left. "But why? What the fuck did I do?"

Janine tilted her head. "Don't be dense, Mads. We know why." Janine waited for the pin to drop but it didn't. She huffed, dropping the spoon in her bowl with a loud clink. "You challenge him. From the day you got here, you refused to do as you were told. I think he knows if he treats you like the others and starts whoring you out, he'll lose that, and he's not ready to give up his party game yet. He doesn't want to tarnish you, he just doesn't want other people to know it."

Madison groaned, taking two cigarettes out and tossing one to Janine. "Am I playing the part of his play thing or not? If he likes being challenged, then eventually, he'll get bored of that too, surely? If I do everything he says?"

Janine puckered her lips as she considered what Madison said, placing her now empty bowl next to her and lighting her cigarette. "Work with me here. You're the one that wants to get out. I can't be the only one putting in brainpower," she said.

They both sat, ruminating in silence.

"I need to know how much I can get away with," Madison mumbled.

Janine nodded. "You need to find a balance, don't make his life too difficult, but don't make it too easy, either." All the scheming sent a steady buzz through her. There was little that brought excitement into the house and she had the urge to giggle like a naughty child. "Don't roll over to everything. Let him know that you're not easily tamed. What does Jase like more than anything else?"

"Cocaine," Madison replied, laughing. Janine joined in, letting herself forget for a moment that having this conversation could get her killed.

"Yes, but no. He loves having control. If he feels like he can have control over someone otherwise uncontrollable, it makes him look good. You have to match him. Turn into someone he considers worth his time and, more importantly, worth the trouble you're going to cause." Madison wrinkled her nose and brows.

"Trouble I'm going to cause?" she asked. Janine bit her grin, rubbing her hands together menacingly.